Cuyahoga Common Pleas Judge Michael Russo emphasized that Castro would never leave prison and that the multiple sentences would be consecutive because of the severity of his crimes. Russo told Castro that the extreme sentence is meant "to punish you."
"You don't deserve to be out in our community," Russo told Castro.
Russo also told Castro that he was to never try to contact his victims — Michelle Knight, Amanda Berry and Gina DeJesus — or Berry's daughter, whom Castro fathered.
Knight, one of the three women Castro has admitted to kidnapping and torturing in his Cleveland home, told him Thursday in court, "You took 11 years of my life away. I went through 11 years of hell, and now your hell is just beginning. You will face hell for an eternity. You will die a little every day. ... You deserve to spend life in prison."
Knight, in an emotional, nervous voice, told the court that she thought about her son, who was 2 when she was abducted, every day she was in captivity and that Christmases were especially hard because she wasn't with him.
"I cried every night. I was so alone," Knight said.
Knight arrived in the courtroom at the end of a late-morning recess, and Castro kept looking over his shoulder at her. Three deputies standing behind Castro told him to look toward the front of the courtroom and away from Knight.
Castro told the court in a rambling statement toward the end of the hearing, "I am not a monster. I am just sick. I have an addiction, just like an alcoholic has an addiction." He also said, "I am not a violent person, and I do have value for human life." Castro claims he is addicted to pornography.
"As God is my witness, I never beat these women as they say I did," Castro said.
